


Suppertime Strops

by RemyRemedial



Series: The 'Stag Do' Universe [11]
Category: Sherlock (TV), Sherlock Holmes & Related Fandoms
Genre: Domestic Discipline, Domestic Fluff, Family Bonding, Family Drama, Family Feels, Family Fluff, Non-Sexual Age Play, Spanking
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-09-06
Updated: 2018-09-06
Packaged: 2019-07-07 21:13:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,315
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15916365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/RemyRemedial/pseuds/RemyRemedial
Summary: Just a relatively ordinary Thursday evening in the Holmes-Lestrade household when Greg is left in-charge of two troublesome toddlers.





	Suppertime Strops

Greg heard a loud thump from the front room and wiped his pizza dough covered hands on a damp cloth and made his way out of the kitchen. When he and Mycroft had been looking for the cottage they had sought out somewhere where they could always keep an eye on the boys. The townhouse was less forgiving in this sense and he had to walk down the hall to the front room,

“Boys,” he started as he walked into the room. He sighed as he saw the two of them rolling around on the floor, wrestling like bear cubs. “Oi!” The boys started and looked across at their Da, not releasing one another. “What have I said about fighting?” Greg raised an eyebrow. John looked sideways at his brother, waiting for him to answer first as he had forgotten.

“Noh to do it.” Sherlock sighed,

“Oh yeh, noh ta do id.” John nodded. 

Greg stepped over the debris of Lego, discarded cushions and action men. “That’s right.” He pulled them apart, “No.” he smacked Sherlock’s bum, “Fighting.” And then John’s. “Last warning lads,” Greg made his way back to the door, careful of where he was putting his feet in case he broke another action man’s arm. He had dealt with hours of tears after that mistake. “Play nicely or you can sit your bums on the bench in the kitchen until Pa gets home.” Greg was just about to leave the room when he heard Sherlock mumble “Means.” Greg would have been hurt were Sherlock older or if he hadn’t accidentally pluralised the word. As it was it was more adorable than cutting.

“Aren’t I just,” Greg paused in the doorway and looked back at the boys on the carpet, “I’m the most means.” He poked out a tongue at the boys causing them to fall apart giggling and left the room. “Behave!” he called as he walked back towards the kitchen.

Greg was laying places at the kitchen counter for them to eat dinner when he heard the hurried sound of four feet, combined with the sound of “Da, Da, Da, Da? Da! Da?!”

“Yes boys?” Greg turned around just in time to hold out his arms and stop the boys from colliding with him. “Wow, easy there.” Both boys were slightly out of breath (most probably from slightly quieter wrestling), John was hopping from one foot to the other and Sherlock tugged on Greg’s sleeve.

“Da…” Sherlock took a couple of deep breaths, “Da, can we do finger paintin pease pease pease?!” Sherlock wiggled his fingers under Greg’s nose to help illustrate his point and joined John in hopping up and down excitedly. 

“Ay, ay, ay. Calm down.” Greg put a hand on each boy’s shoulder and tried to hold them still for a moment. “Now what was that?”

“Paintin!” John chirped, “Wif our fingers, like dis,” John swept a finger across Greg’s chest, “And dis, and dis.” John painted a tiny masterpiece in invisible paint on Greg’s shirt.

“Okay, John-John,” Greg chuckled, lightly taking John’s hand in his and holding him still again. “I see. But where has this idea come from, eh?”

“Telly!” John answered without thinking and Sherlock gasped, hurriedly covering John’s mouth with his hand.

“Nooo, John-John. Shushes.” Sherlock took his hand away and covered his own mouth with his finger, John copied him. Then they both turned their attention back to their Da, hopeful that he had missed that little part of the conversation. He looked cross.

“Telly?” Greg asked. “Have you two been watching the television?” John’s eyes darted to Sherlock who was shaking his head, so John copied him. “Don’t you two lie to me. Have you been watching the telly?”

“Jus for a minit.” Sherlock held up his thumb and forefinger very close together.

“Boys, I said no telly.”

“So can we do paintin, cos thas not telly?” Sherlock asked sweetly.

“Can you…” Greg sighed, “You can get your bums spanked for being naughty, how about that?” 

“No fank-yoo!” Sherlock grabbed his brother’s hand and pulled him out of the kitchen towards the front room, Greg sighed and called after them,

“Very thin ice, my boys!” Greg went back to preparing dinner. 

Five minutes later Greg heard another loud thud, followed by even louder giggling from both boys. He sighed and leaned his head against the counter top, counting slowly back from ten. “Three, two aaand one.” He sighed again before walking over to the shelves in the kitchen where they kept a selection of toys for their sons. He picked up two large sheets of paper and the box of crayons and marched down the hallway.

He walked into the front room, ignoring the scrapping puppies on the other side of the room and put down the paper and crayons on the floor in the middle of the room. Then with a loud sigh he stepped over to the boys and picked them both up by the back of their t-shirts, carrying them over to the colouring set up in a move that mimicked a dad dog carrying two babies. He put them both down by the paper and folded his legs, sitting down in between them. Neither boy tried to sit up, instead the lay on their tummies, resting their heads in their folded arms.

“Right.” Greg took another deep breath, calming himself. “You two are going to lay here and colour nicely until your Pa gets home. No. More. Trouble.” He looked between the two sheepish boys. He picked two crayons out of the box and handled one to each of them. “Be good.” Greg stood up and walked back to the kitchen.

Greg had finished preparing dinner just in time for the ‘I’m on my way home,’ text from Mycroft. He put the pizzas into the oven, sat on a stool at the island and opened a cold beer. Then came the thudding of excited feet once again. The boys burst into the kitchen, pushing each other out of the way to be first, both boys clinging onto their own sheet of paper.

“Easy, boys.” They continued to fight each other as they made their way to the island,

“Da I drewed you a picha!”

“Mines better!”

“No mines betterer!”

“Na-huh!”

“Ya-huh!”

“Ay, ay, ay! Enough.” Greg held up a hand and both boys fell quiet. “Right, sit down and then you can show me.” The boys sat down at their usual seat at the counter top and slid their paper across to Greg who smiled down at both of their drawings. Sherlock’s looked like an attempt at a drawing of Greg, complete with his shiny badge. John’s was…very colourful.

“Is this me, Lock?”

“A-huh!” Sherlock nodded with a broad grin. 

“It’s wonderful, it looks just like me!” Greg leaned over to ruffle Sherlock’s hair, he could practically feel the pride seeping out of him, “I could use this as my work I.D, eh?”

“Yeh!”

“And John-John…” Greg stuttered, “Could you help me out lad, what’s this then?”

“Is colours!” John grinned, and Greg grinned back, chuckling,

“So it is. It’s the most beautiful selection of colours I’ve ever seen!”

“Tis?”

“Oh, absolutely. Right, I think these two belong on the fridge.” Greg stood up and put them both on the fridge, held up with a magnet. Then he opened the fridge and took out a (sugar free at Mycroft’s insistence) juice box for each boy. (One was grape for Sherlock, he had once heard Mycroft describe a bad glass of wine as ‘glorified grape juice’ and ever since had insisted that his favourite drink was grape juice, he was particularly fond of drinking it when Mycroft had a glass of wine in the evening, thinking he was having the same as his Pa. The other was orange because John had taken a liking to the little orange character on the boxes and affectionately called him ‘Norman’, no one knew why.)

“Yay, joos!” Sherlock cheered, taking his box and stabbing the straw through the foil like a pro, “Firs time Da, look!”

“Oh, well done love.” Greg stroked his hair and passed John his carton.

“Ello Norman!” John waved at the box and frowned when Norman didn’t wave back. He held up the box for Greg, “Da do it?”

“What’s the magic word, John-John?”

John instinctively looked over at Sherlock who stage whispered ‘Pease’. John nodded and turned back to Greg, “Pease, Da?” Greg chuckled.

“That’s the one, good boy. Give it here.” Greg took the box, put the straw in and unfolded the flaps at the side for John to hold. “There you are big boy.”

Greg was just settled back in his own seat when they heard the front door opening.

“Pa!” Sherlock was the first to run, John-John ran after him but stopped and raced back to give Greg a quick hug before running back off in the direction of the front door.

The sound of Mycroft having the wind knocked out of him was audible from the kitchen.

“Owf. Hello my dears.” Mycroft was completely immobilized by the boy’s hugs. “Okay, my loves, let me take my coat off.” The boys reluctantly let Mycroft go for long enough to slip his coat off and onto the hook by the door. “Right, there we go. John-John, do you want to climb up?” John was on Mycroft’s back in an instant, sighing as he rested his chin on his Pa’s shoulder. Having had much practice at this, Mycroft was able to wrap one hand around John’s feet, keeping him in place. He wiggled the fingers of his free hand at Sherlock and waited until he intertwined his fingers in his own, squeezing his hand. “Lead the way, clever clogs.” Sherlock happily skipped down the hall to the kitchen with Mycroft and John in tow. 

“Evenin’, love.” Greg smiled as Mycroft walked into the kitchen.

“Hello dear.” Mycroft smiled back, approaching a seat and pulling the stools on either side up close. “Sit down boys.” They did and Mycroft sat in between them, Sherlock sighed and leaned his head on his Pa’s shoulder, John took Mycroft’s hand and sucked his fingers. “Oh, John, what did we say about fingers, hm? Let me get you a dummy.”

“No!” John held Mycroft’s hand tighter.

“John, do as you’re told.”

“No!”

“What’s gotten into you then? Have you been naughty for your Da, hm?” John released Mycroft’s hand and buried his face in his arms, folded on the table. 

“No!”

“John Hamish.” Mycroft issued his name dangerously before looking over at his husband.

“They’ve both been a bit…boisterous, this evening.”

“Boisterous? Well I don’t like the sound of that, Lock, have you been naughty?”

Sherlock took his head from Mycroft’s shoulder, frowned and mumbled, “No.” before putting his thumb in his mouth.

“Oh dear. Do you know what I think? I think you’re both stropping because you know you’ve been naughty and you don’t want to be in trouble for it.”

“I think that sounds about right.” Greg mumbled with a wink for his husband as he went to the oven to take out the pizzas. 

“Well, I think you’d both better apologise to your Da for being naughty and then behave yourselves until bedtime. Tomorrow morning, we’ll have a little chat about your behaviour.”

Sherlock tugged at Mycroft’s sleeve, “No spanks, huh, Pa?”

“Not if you’re a very good boy for the rest of the evening.”

“I can do tha.” Sherlock nodded.

“That’s a good boy. John?”

“No!” John still wouldn’t come out of his fortress. Greg looked up from where he was putting slices of pizza onto plates,

“John, lad.” He warned.

Mycroft looked at his husband, “Is someone very tired?” he asked, nodding in John’s direction.

“I should think so, he’s been wrestling with his big brother for the best part of the evening.”

“Wrestling?!” Mycroft sighed and looked between the boys, “Boy’s what have we said about fighting?” only Sherlock looked back at him,

“Not to do id.” Sherlock pouted. 

“Mm. And the only reason you’re not getting your bum smacked right now is because you’ve promised to behave for the rest of the evening. Understand?”

“A-huh.” Sherlock nodded.

“If I had known you’d been fighting you’d have been over my knee the second I came through the door.” Mycroft frowned down at Sherlock.

“Sorry Pa.”

“So I should think, say sorry to Da.” Mycroft planted a quick kiss on his husbands cheek as he put a plate of food in front of him and Sherlock.

“Sorry Da.”

“That’s alright, Lock, but no more fighting, eh?” Greg pinched Sherlock’s chin and brought his forehead close so he could kiss it, “Now eat your dinner.” Sherlock nodded and started to pick at his food.

“John, sit up and eat your dinner.” Greg put a plate in front of his youngest and rubbed his back before sitting down on his own seat and starting to eat. John finally pushed himself up from his arms but pushed his plate away,

“Don wannit.”

“Do you want me to feed you?” Mycroft offered.

“No, don wannit!” John huffed and pushed his plate again.

Mycroft sighed and reached over to stroke John’s hair, he looked across at Greg, “I think someone’s about ready for bed.”

“No!” John slammed his fists down onto the counter and Sherlock flinched, Mycroft was caught between calming Sherlock and trying to settle John. Greg pushed himself up with a sigh, forgetting about his dinner.

“You look after Lock, I’ll deal with grumpy.” Mycroft nodded and tried to distract Sherlock by feeding him while Greg manhandled John over his shoulder and carried him out of the room. The second he was lifted from the stool John started wailing and thumping his hands against Greg’s back. 

Greg tightened his grip around John’s legs to make sure he didn’t wiggle out of his hold and started to carry him upstairs, “If you don’t settle down right now lad, you’ll be in big trouble.” John continued to throw a fit as he was carried up into the boy’s bedroom, Greg walked over to his bed and sat down, manoeuvring John off of his shoulder in the process. “That’s enough now, John.”

“Nooooo!” John stamped his feet over and over again but couldn’t move away from Greg who held onto his arms.

“Listen, John, this is your warning young man.” Greg looked seriously at John who just sniffed and tried to pull his arms from Greg’s grasp.

“Geroff me!”

At that point Greg had officially had enough. He took a long deep breath and wrested John over his knee, spanking him hard to enough that he would feel it but not so hard that he couldn’t do it again properly in a minute. “That’s. Enough! Settle down lad, right now!” Greg spanked for about a minute before John went limp and startled sniffling over his knee. Greg helped him up and looked up at him sternly, “Are you going to listen now?”

John nodded, sniffed, shuffled from foot to foot and rubbed his face on his sleeve.

“Good. Now then, you know that tantrums aren’t acceptable behaviour in this house. So, after all that fuss you’re going to get your bum smacked- “

“Nooo, you already did smacks.” John started to fuss again, trying to wriggle away from Greg. Greg smacked John’s thigh and he stilled.

“Are you listening little lad?”

“A-huh.” John hiccupped.

“Okay, come and sit on Da’s knee for a minute.” John allowed himself to be settled on Greg’s knee and leaned his head against his shoulder, sucking on his thumb and picking at Greg’s shirt with his free hand. “Now then baby boy, I know you’re tired and you think Da is being a big meanie for spanking you- “

“Yeh.” John mumbled, and Greg smirked to himself, cheeky little thing.

“But, you just threw a big wobbler and you know that’s not allowed, don’t you?”

“Yeh.” John sighed.

“Yeah, strops earn you smacks, don’t they?”

“Mm.”

“And I smacked you just now because you wouldn’t listen, so I had to get your attention. Which I got, didn’t I?”

“Yeh.”

“So now Da’s going to spank you for your tantrum- “John started to fuss a little bit in Greg’s lap, so he shushed him and rubbed his back until he settled again. “But, because you’re only little and I already gave you a little spanking you’re only going to get three smacks John.” Greg held up three fingers for John to see. He could tell that he was really quite young and very tired and didn’t want to overwhelm him. “So, you be a good boy and stand up.” John did, though it was clear he was reluctant. Greg turned him to the side, braced an arm against John’s stomach and pulled down his trousers and pull up before quickly landing three hard smacks.

John instantly whined and started to cry which broke Greg’s heart, so he helped him step out of his trousers, righted his pull up before he had a chance to worry about it and lay him down on his stomach on the bed. Greg sat down next to him and stretched out, pulling John to rest on his chest. “Oh, you’ll be alright buddy.” He kissed his youngest’s hair and stroked his back, letting him calm down before he thought about getting him ready for bed. “You just let Da cuddle you, eh?” John nodded against Greg’s chest and he held him close, “Such a brave boy.”

They had been curled up for a little while when the door to the bedroom creaked open and Mycroft ushered in a freshly bathed Sherlock, wrapped in a towel. “There they are, see.” Mycroft rubbed Sherlock’s arm, the little guy looked a bit concerned but mostly tired.

“John-John okay, Da?”

“Of course, Lock, come ‘ere.” Sherlock hopped over and Greg wrapped an arm around his waist pulling him in for a hug from his position sat on the bed. “He’s got a bit of a sore bum, but he’s fine.”

“Oh no, spanks?” Sherlock asked.

“I should think so.” Mycroft mumbled as he sat down on Sherlock’s bed, a pile of fresh pyjamas beside him, “Come on Lock, let’s get you ready for bed.” Sherlock shuffled over to Mycroft and let him start dressing him for bed.

“We ged spanks fur strops, huh Pa?” Sherlock mumbled as Mycroft helped him into his pyjamas.

“That’s exactly right, sweetheart.”

“Mm.” Sherlock nodded sadly.

“That’s not how we communicate, is it Lock?”

“No.” Sherlock shook his head with a pout.

Greg looked down at the sleepy bundle in his lap, “John, poppet, let’s get you into some jammies.” John fussed a little and clutched Greg even tighter. “Oh, I know, I know, someone’s very tired. You stay there, and I’ll get you all cosy.” Greg managed to release himself from John’s fists and started getting him dressed for bed too. Every now and then Mycroft and Greg would exchange sympathetic, loving looks and before long they had both of the boys tucked into bed.

John clutched at Greg’s hand and tried to pull his hand towards his mouth.

“Okay fuss pot, here you go.” Greg took a pacifier from the drawer and slipped it between John’s lips before pulling over one of the small armchairs from the corner, setting it next to the bed, “I’ll be right here monster. Close your eyes and get some sleep.”

Mycroft wandered over to his husband and leaned in for a kiss. Greg sighed and mumbled, “I’ll be down in a little bit, once they’ve fallen asleep.” Mycroft hummed in agreement and left the room, turning out the lights as he went and leaving the door open to allow the light of the hallway to keep the boys from being frightened of the dark.


End file.
